Naturalist Perspectives Challenge 4: Wrap-Up

Over the semester, I learned a lot during these naturalist perspective assignments and challenges. Not only did I learn to love the environment around me and notice things I didn't before that I see daily, but I also learned how to blog and notice the season changes more intensely this year.
For example, during the first assignment I got to look closer at a beautiful garden I would walk by often, and identify it as my sight Alpha. I learned what flowers were present, watched them change between when the first and second assignment were due. I also learned which ones were pollinators and how that effects the area surrounding them. Another assignment that taught me a lot was the water in the landscape assignment. It taught me how to find the pH of water, and how to apply the things I learned in the classroom into real life experiences. Third of all, the bird challenge was fun because I would occasionally see these turkeys walking around the city and think it was funny, but I never knew why they were there until I had to research them. Researching these things around me was very cool, because I never thought to look so deeply into most of the landscape around me and question its presence, but I'm glad I was told to because now I understand it on a deeper level. Another assignment that stood out to me was identifying site gamma for the same reasons. I got to fully understand the area right outside my window and realize how humans effect this nature, how nature takes over, and wonder how many macromolecules these things must be made up of. Lastly, comparing the sights alpha, beta, and gamma, was really interesting to me because they are all so close to one another and so similar, but so different at the same time. They were all dirt leaf and tree filled, but there was an array of different man made wastes and plants at each site. By doing these assignments, I can teach someone about the aspects of Biology much easier than I would have due to the fact that I now know where they are in every day life and how to relate them to the local areas.